What is Testing as a Service (Taas)?

In this article, you will learn everything about Testing as a Service and some of the most popular TaaS solutions. First, let's start with a brief definition of TaaS.

What is Testing as a Service (TaaS) and how does it work?

Testing as a Service, abbreviated as TaaS, is a model where businesses outsource product software testing to companies that specialize in testing activities. In other words, testing is a service.

While there are many reasons to choose TaaS, the biggest draw of the TaaS model is that it allows businesses to focus on other important areas of the business, such as product improvement or services, researching new products or planning marketing and sales goals, instead of spending time on repetitive tasks like software testing.

Another key feature of TaaS is scalability. In the early days of software development, you will have to give up software testing completely if you are a small company with limited budget. But now, no matter the size of your company, you can sign up for the service model that best suits your pocket.

Testing as a Service is performed both by humans and through automation. Those involved in manual testing, known as QA (Quality Assurance) analysts, perform a series of step-by-step processes to find defects in key application features.

On the other hand, in test automation, tools and scripts are used to do the testing for you. Naturally, test automation is better in terms of efficiency and speed.

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However, you need someone to write those automated scripts for you. It is also not wise to choose to complete all testing manually, as much of the repetitive work can be automated, but you or your organization may miss the nuances. that the actual tester can provide. Combining both manual and automated testing is the best approach.

Types of solutions Testing as a Service

There are several types of TaaS that cater to different needs that arise during the testing phase of a product. You can even choose as many testing services as you need.

1. Functional Testing as a Service

This is a type of testing in which the QA analyst determines if a piece of software is working according to its functional requirements. It is done by entering inputs to the software and verifying the output to see if the software is working as intended. Functional testing is often called 'black-box testing', as we are only interested in the results of the software rather than its structure or inner workings. Test the software for navigation functionality, usability and fault conditions.

2. Performance Testing as a Service

In performance testing, the stability, speed, and responsiveness of the software are evaluated. It is done by recreating the real world environment by creating virtual users and performing various tests like soak testing, spike testing, stress testing, etc.

3. Security Testing as a Service

A type of software testing, security testing is done to ensure that the application is safe and free of any vulnerabilities against malicious threats. In security software testing, a thorough scan of the software is done to find any possible loopholes. And if there are indeed any vulnerabilities, the QAs will then work to address them.

4. Regression Testing as a Service

Regression testing is performed to ensure that changing the original code or adding new functionality does not adversely affect the application. It also verifies whether the new changes solve the previous problem. Even a small, unwarranted change can cause unexpected problems. Regression testing is a way to verify if this is the case.

When to use Testing as a Service (TaaS)?

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Testing as a Service is based on the outsourcing model. While cost cutting is an important factor in outsourcing, it is not the only factor. Here are a bunch of other variables that make TaaS a preferred choice over traditional software testing.

Expertise

While a company focuses on developing its product, devoting resources to testing can be a major distraction. This is not to say that testing should not be taken seriously, on the contrary, it is indeed very important. Instead of making developers work on testing (in parallel with product development) or hiring and setting up a new department for testing, a much wiser approach is to hire a company specializes in providing testing services.

Lack of testing infrastructure

When starting out, most companies lack the necessary resources to perform testing. This includes software testing, hardware infrastructure, server costs, etc. The resources required to set up all of this testing often far outweigh the potential profits.

Improved testing standards

The test processing for your products can affect the output of the results. Hiring a professional testing company can make the testing process more efficient and thus, make your applications bug free and more robust.

Samuel Daniel

Update 25 May 2021